​Fyvush Finkel: A character actor who's a real character

There's no mistaking FINKEL & SONS for a law firm or any such profession No, this group is strictly show business, in the tradition of its irrepressible founding father. Here's Richard Schlesinger of "48 Hours":

He has what no less an authority than The New York Times called "the face that could launch a thousand shticks."

"You know what they say: Jews don't drink. It interferes with their suffering."

It belongs to a man whose name seems tailored for the face: Fyvush Finkel.

It's hard to imagine "Philip" Finkel having a career like Fyvush Finkel's.

"There was a family, very religious family, they called a matchmaker. And he said to them, 'I have the perfect girl for you. She's so religious that it's a joy --' The kid is getting annoyed and says, 'Never mind all that. I want to know one thing: Is she any good in bed? The matchmaker says, 'Well I don't know. Some people say yes, some people say no ...'"

Not long ago, he was headlining a father-and-sons nightclub act with his kids -- 61-year-old Elliott on piano and 65-year-old Ian on xylophone -- at the nightclub 54 Below in New York.

Fyvush Finkel in "Picket Fences"
CBS

He's 91 now, and for more than 80 years he's been on one stage or another, on the big screen, and most notably on the small screen in (among other productions) the '90s TV show, "Picket Fences."

He won an Emmy for portraying eccentric lawyer Douglas Wambaugh. Finkel was 71 then; it was the highpoint of a career that started when he was nine.

Fyvush Finkel made his name on Second Avenue in New York, where the great Yiddish theatres stood.

He started singing as a boy soprano: "I got a dollar a night," he laughed. "And I was the hero of the family, making $8 a week, you know?"

By the time he was a teenager, he was a first-rate Second Avenue star, and by his 40s he was one of the highest-paid actors in Yiddish theatre.

CBS News

"And don't forget that it was 1943 when I sang and I danced. In fact, I was a jitterbug."

"You jitterbugged and sang in Yiddish?" Schlesinger asked.

"Yes, certainly. You take a song - 'I'm gonna dance with a dolly with a hole in her stocking while her knees keep a-knockin' and her toes keep a-rockin'' -- the house came down!"

Finkel sang and danced his way up and down New York's Second Avenue which was, for most of the 20th century, the Yiddish theatre district. But most of the houses that he brought down were torn down when the Yiddish theatre largely died out. Finkel found himself in his 40s the father of two and a star without a stage.

He had to find work where he could. "I did bar mitzvahs, I entertained at weddings. I did all that, you know?"

But he didn't do it for long. Director Jerome Robbins called him to audition for "Fiddler on the Roof."